Facebook Promoted Post Results (Dude, they suck)

1483 Views 20 Replies 16 Participants Last post by Avarian, Feb 19, 2013

H.M. Ward

Discussion Starter · Feb 18, 2013

Okay, this is the 3rd time I've tried a promoted post on FB with dismal response. I thought I'd share my experience since there are better ways to get more bang for your buck. I also had a question (posted below) about promoted posts and reach vs views.

Here is a pic of my post and the text. I launched a book over Val Day. I had to make it into a book to get them to run the pic. Apparently their bot is really stupid. Text on products is okay, but they kept rejecting book covers. Anyway, this one worked b/c its the product.

It was supposed to be seen by 20K-40K of my fans (nice range, right?) for $200. Stuff I noticed: They like to bill a disproportional amount to the number of ppl who have seen the post. When the post had around 1K views, they billed me $80. I tried to run a promoted post recently and they cancelled it twice after billing me the initial $80 on each run. It was rejected b/c the cover has words on it. Anyway, you'd think that $100 would = approx 10,000-20,000 fans would see the post, but no. It doesn't seem to work that way.

Back to the approved ad: The promoted post ran for three days. I went to the post to look and see how many ppl had seen it and here is my question. According to the post, it says that 10,684 ppl saw this post. When I click on the ad results, it shows 38K ppl saw this post. Uhm, wth? Those are two very different numbers. The big words over the spot where you select which payment option to do says: Promote this post to reach more people in news feed. Reach isn't the same thing, or is it? I thought the ad was to make the post more visible in the news feeds. Can someone clarify this part? It feels like a bait and switch to me, especially b/c they don't explain it on the purchase page.

It also generated horribly low click through rates. That was a dismal response rate for a paid post. I get better responses by making regular posts. The whole thing is very sketchy to me. Of course I'd like to ask someone in billing for clarification, but they don't do that.

Anyway, just thought that I would share. This page has 48,000 fans and is my main page for all my titles. I know some of you had better luck than me, but after 3 times, I give up.

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Griffin Hayes

· #2 · Feb 18, 2013

Sorry, I can't explain it, but I can tell you last year I did a series of expensive and completely useless promos via FB. Again, apparently thousands and thousands of people clicked on the ad and less than .001% bought a copy. My problem is I find it hard to trust the figures they throw up. They could just as easily put 50k and who's to dispute it?

Incidentally, I also ran ads via Goodreads and had a few hundred people add my book to their TBR lists, but I couldn't tell you how many of those actually became sales. I'm guessing very few, especially considering many of those people already had thousands of books they were waiting to read. My best experience with ads came from Bookbub, but the catch there is the price of your book has to be knocked down (usually to .99 cents) and even then I only made thirty of forty bucks in profit. So it was good, but not great.

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katiemoe

· #3 · Feb 18, 2013

My experience with Facebook promotion is similar.

They needed a new revenue stream, but the value of it seems highly questionable and difficult to properly measure.

I used to do promotions to build likes to my page, until I realized if I paid for clicks that resulted in 100 Likes, that only about 10-15% of those paid-for Likes would end up seeing my posts anyway. 85-90% of the Likes I had paid to obtain would never see my posts. It was then I realized it was throwing money down a black hole.

Justawriter

· #4 · Feb 18, 2013

Holly,

With promoted posts do they only go to your fans? Or can you target people you're not connected to? I wonder if you'd have different results if you go outside of your fans? Also wonder if you just did the post without promoting it how many of your fans would see it? Does Facebook tell you that?

H.M. Ward

Discussion Starter · #5 · Feb 18, 2013

PamelaKelley said:
Holly,

With promoted posts do they only go to your fans? Or can you target people you're not connected to? I wonder if you'd have different results if you go outside of your fans? Also wonder if you just did the post without promoting it how many of your fans would see it? Does Facebook tell you that?

I had the option to limit to page fans or do fans and their friends. This time I only did fans. I chose the other option in the past with similar results. FB provides stats on how many ppl see ea post. That's part if the issue here. See the 2nd image? Total views says 10K (boxed in red) but the paid post stats say reach was 38K. I didn't expect those numbers to be different. I didn't think reach was page views, but that's what it was sold as. Anyway, it's not a good place to spend money. The free features are fine and I got a much better response on nonpaid posts.

N. Gemini Sasson

· #6 · Feb 18, 2013

Sorry the results were so disappointing, Holly. But thank you for sharing and letting us all know. It hacks me off that FB has limited how many of your posts may show up and then it seems they sucker you into paying for ads and promos with sketchy results.

Gennita Low

· #7 · Feb 19, 2013

I've only set the budget to $5 or $10. I usually get (supposedly) 600 "views" for $5 or a bit over 1000 for 10. The click-throughs paid for the ad IF the persons bought the book. So far, each time, I've gotten 3 to 5 click-throughs, which essentially, made me my ad $$$ back IF there were sales. I can't fathom spending $200 on FB!

Patty Jansen

· #8 · Feb 19, 2013

I'd been thinking about this. So you sat the ad for click-throughs rather than views? That's what seemed most sensible to me. What percentage ended up buying?

H.M. Ward

Discussion Starter · #9 · Feb 19, 2013

Patty Jansen said:
I'd been thinking about this. So you sat the ad for click-throughs rather than views? That's what seemed most sensible to me. What percentage ended up buying?

36 click throughs from 38,000 fan views (or 10,000 depending on which number is correct - they gave 2 sets of numbers for post views). This is a promoted post, not PPC ads that are on the sidebar. Those kind of ads do so-so and cost way less.

B. Justin Shier

· #10 · Feb 19, 2013

Thank you so much for sharing this. To add some context, and went searching for what the cost-per-click (CPC) is on a humdrum Google search ad.

"WordStream found that the average CPC on Google search was $0.53" -source

Your CPC would be $200.00 / 36 clicks = $5.56 per click.

From the same article as above, the top spending industry is finance, with an average CPC of just over $3 a click on search ads and $1 a click on network ads.

B.

31842

· #11 · Feb 19, 2013

I ran an ad on Facebook a few years back and my experience was very similar. I've wondered if things had changed at all. Thank you so much for sharing your experience! I'll take my money to a casino, instead. Sounds like Vegas still has better odds.

Cege Smith

· #12 · Feb 19, 2013

I agree with Kate- I think something changed recently. Granted I have a much smaller number (1100) but the FB promoted posts have been far less effect since the beginning of the month.

On Jan. 12th, I paid $10 to reach 1K-2K people. That post was seen by "965 people". The "paid reach" was 1,986. Right on par with expectations.

On Feb. 1st, I paid $15 to reach 2K-3K people. The post was seen by "209 people". The "paid reach" was 1,345.

Then last week (Feb. 14th), I paid $10 to promote my latest release. It says "This post was seen by 420 people" and the "paid reach" was 1,165.

This makes NO sense. $:-\$

I definitely seem to get more traction on just regular old posts these days. I'm hesitant to drop anymore money into that venture.

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SBJones

· #13 · Feb 19, 2013

My friend and I had a discussion about Facebook. I was in the camp of that it was on it's way out and the changes they were making like paid messages and promote this post would kill it. My friend was on the other side saying it was fine. After a few beers, I am convinced that Facebook is for people to connect with people. Trying to use it as a source for advertising in it's current inception is a general waste of time for most of us. You are better off just making four or five related posts instead of trying to promote one that costs you money. Eventually even that won't work anymore. People who use Facebook don't want to be advertised to and Facebook is making it to where people will have to actively visit your page to see anything while they increase the costs to you, the advertiser to reach them.

Where your Facebook advertising is going to come from is by posting your ad/announcement somewhere else and getting it "shared" to Facebook. That's how all the news articles and YouTube videos are getting it done these days.

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BlankPage

· #14 · Feb 19, 2013

Comment removed due to VS TOS 25/9/2018

MsTee

· #15 · Feb 19, 2013

When I first ran an FB ad, I didn't know a thing about them, and I used it to get some eyes on my FB page. I was super excited when I saw 50+ likes come in on my first day. So, I went and checked out the profiles of these individuals, and whaddaya know? They're all fake. Most of these users had just joined Facebook yet had over 7000+ pages they 'liked', and the only interaction on their pages were automated games and questionnaires. I promptly deleted them.

With some newfound knowledge about how to run a successful ad, I ran a tailored FB ad again for a few days. FB claimed > 200 clicks, but when I checked my Google Analytics - NOTHING OF THE SORT!

I most certainly will not be handing any more money over to Facebook. I no longer trust their reports, especially after the concerning results that pop up whenever you Google 'fake Facebook likes.'

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Gennita Low

· #16 · Feb 19, 2013

Tracy--totally off-topic--LOL, you tricked me into thinking there was a bug on my page! Funny siggy.

MsTee

· #17 · Feb 19, 2013

Gennita Low said:
Tracy--totally off-topic--LOL, you tricked me into thinking there was a bug on my page! Funny siggy.

Lol! Gennita, I think I've annoyed just about everybody on this board with my avatar.

Reviews on The Bug Avatar:

It even annoyed my four year old! - Owner of Bookkoop

I slapped my laptop screen, trying to crush it. - (paraphrased) KB Member

Eugh. I hate bugs. They're so disgusting. But this is so cool! - Me

ingrid avluv

· #18 · Feb 19, 2013

These are the results across the board, almost universally. Facebook's push to monetize (driven by stockholders crying for dividend payments and speculators) is the biggest scam in US finance since the housing bubble. "Likes" mean nothing and are worth nothing. Same with views. It's all a scam. The only thing that means anything to you is the number of sales, and "promoted posts" won't bring you any.

Avarian

· #19 · Feb 19, 2013

holly w. said:
Back to the approved ad: The promoted post ran for three days. I went to the post to look and see how many ppl had seen it and here is my question. According to the post, it says that 10,684 ppl saw this post. When I click on the ad results, it shows 38K ppl saw this post. Uhm, wth? Those are two very different numbers. The big words over the spot where you select which payment option to do says: Promote this post to reach more people in news feed. Reach isn't the same thing, or is it? I thought the ad was to make the post more visible in the news feeds. Can someone clarify this part? It feels like a bait and switch to me, especially b/c they don't explain it on the purchase page.

Your ad views count each time a person sees your post, so a single person can represent more than one view. The "People saw this post" is how many people actually saw the post.
This all means that around 10.000 people saw your post, while the ad represented 38.311 views to an undefined number of these people. So you do not get a tangible number for how many people actually saw your post b/c of the ad, only how many times people saw it b/c of the ad.

My general experience with the "promoted post" feature is that it can work well, if you have a high engagemnet on your page, and the post you promote is engaging.

In your case, Holly. You use pictures well, but I would suggest that you add questions to some of your posts to get a response from your fans. For example, when you launch a new book you can add a question like "When will you read it?" or if it is a series "Which character do you want to read more about?".
This encourages people to write a comment, and this increases the reach on the post, because it will rate higher in peoples' news feed.

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RuthNestvold

· #20 · Feb 19, 2013

Thanks for sharing your experience, Holly. This is the kind of information that makes KB so valuable!

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